The Orthodox Churches are unanimous in their hostility to the existence of Catholic Churches of Byzantine rite. They fear that Catholicism seen within the framework of the rite that they know must needs be more attractive to Orthodox people than when seen within the framework of the unfamiliar Latin rite. But this tactical objection is not the only one. Behind it lies a deeper conviction, two convictions in fact.

First, there is the conviction that it is the Orthodox Churches, and not the Roman Church, that have remained wholly and completely faithful to Christ’s teaching and to the tradition of the Apostles and the primitive Church. This is so much so that in Orthodox eyes to make an act of adhesion to the Roman communion is to give up something of the revealed faith and to cut oneself off from the true Church founded by our Lord Jesus Christ. We believe this conviction is mistaken, and we indeed have good reasons for doing so. But we must recognize that it is a conviction that governs the Orthodox attitude.

The other conviction is connected with the first one. It is that the Roman Church is not and cannot be anything but the patriarchate of the West, whose head is the bishop of Rome; she is therefore of her very nature, as it were by definition, limited to the Churches of the Latin rite.